Going straight? John ‘Primo’ Grant and John Diaz in Five Star.
Photograph: Supplied

“These streets” is a commonly heard phrase in Five Star. Not, when discussing the ubiquitous danger and hardship the urban environment represents, “the streets”. This simple linguistic tic represents everything that makes Five Star – an extremely low-budget, brief, plot-light film with non-professional actors – worth seeking out. Director Keith Miller has done a remarkable job of inserting himself into the culture of housing projects, drug runners and gangs, giving his coming-of-age tale a near-documentary feel. This is both a blessing and a curse. The verisimilitude is a poke at the cliche-riddled work seen on television crime shows, but its lack of stylisation and mundane focus can leave you thirsting for, if not some drama, at least a tad more pizzazz.

We open with a lengthy, heartfelt monologue from Primo (John “Primo” Grant), a large, tattooed African American who, while driving, explains to an unseen passenger the turning point in his life: when his son was born he was in prison, and was unable to welcome him into the world. He vowed to never leave his children again. By going straight? Well, not really, but by being more careful. Primo is a “five star general” in New York’s Bloods. He’s a big enough leader that people take risks for him, and he can walk among other gangs. John (John Diaz) is a kid just come of age whose father, Primo’s mentor Melvin, was just killed by (so it’s said) a stray bullet.

John’s mother (Wanda Nobles Colon) wants John to take a job at a supermarket and to keep his nose clean. She’s not unreasonable about reality (“You know about safe sex?” she embarrasses him over dinner) but she’s unaware that he’s begun linking up with Primo and what’s going on in (points to the window) “these streets”.

Primo is a natural in front of the camera, lending Five Star a weighty sadness reminiscent of James Gandolfini’s Tony Soprano. One moment he’s beating the snot out of someone late with a payment, the next he’s pushing his daughter on the swings. He takes John under his wing, offering lessons in how to win respect. What follows isn’t all that sexy. There’s a lot of walking around Brooklyn’s less photographed neighbourhoods, dropping off packages. Additionally, Primo is doing his best to supplement his income by going straight. He’s a doorman at a bar on weekends and, after a plea for additional work, is hired as private security for a night.

This last bit is a great storytelling switch on Miller’s part. You think the job is going to lead to a beating or a shakedown. Primo’s club boss’s sister has “a crazy ex”, but all it really means is just showing up at his nephew’s Bar Mitzvah to linger and make sure things don’t get out of hand. The sociological juxtaposition (as well as a quick chat about “becoming a man”) has resonance, and shows Miller’s commitment to quieter, less-explosive realism.

But a movie has to have some conflict, so things do take a turn toward the end. We learn a bit more about John’s late father Melvin and how John hardly saw him growing up. Primo may know more than he lets on about Melvin’s death and there is an eventual showdown. What had heretofore been Five Star’s greatest asset, its fly-on-the-wall detachment, soon becomes a problem.

Miller’s previous film, the marvelous Welcome to Pine Hill, also featured a plus-size African-American man trying to turn his back on his criminal past. (Miller is not a person of colour, so this double-feature is somewhat notable in that regard.) The one-way trip nature of that film – tying up loose ends before disappearing in the woods to die – is perhaps a bit more conducive to Miller’s style. Characters and settings could drift into and then recede from the narrative, and our interest was drawn in by the current. The final, conventional scenes of Five Star don’t make for a comfortable fit. It’s hard out there in these streets, but tough to empathize in these seats, too.